Unlike the introductory notices to the Tale of a Tub, this short preface seems not to be the work of Swift. It must have been written after 1703, when Charles Boyle became Earl of Orrery; but Swift seems to have added very little to either treatise after 1697 or 1698. The note contains none of the characteristic marks of his style, and he probably left the bookseller to employ some hack for the purpose. Throughout the Battle of the Books Swift's style is rather more careful and regular than in most of his work.